I saw a reference today to Indiana Jones today that made me think of Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, a recollection not as painful for me as it should be, as I have not seen the much-reviled latest installment in the series. This is because, as I've mentioned in the past, MrsBlue and I end up seeing a vast majority of movies after they come to cable/satellite, especially when the reviews are as mixed (to put it kindly) as they were for Indy 4. Which brings me to my point: Is Spielberg so embarrassed by this film he's keeping it off cable? It was released well over four years ago, and its absence from the small screen is starting to seem like the it's getting The Star Wars Holiday Special treatment. By all accounts this is deserved, but I remain masochistically curious to see it.

Ant wrote on Oct 14, 2012, 15:08:Blue, NBC showed it on local broadcast twice AFAIK. I watched it twice: in local AMC theater in film format (ugh) and in HD from NBC. Both sucked. See http://aqfl.net/node/6179 for the poll, comments, and my links.

NBC is showing it again on CATurday night, the 24th! This will be the third time!

- Inconsistent characterization (major discrepancies in established characters vs actions, even taken in context)- Uneven plot (too many divergent sideplots vying for attention and the main plot themes are never really explored as a result)- Bizarre pacing (the movie takes too long to get going then overstays its welcome when it does)

The Honest Trailer for it totally demolishes most of the major points but it is far from exhaustive in outlining the movies issues. You don't have to be a nitpicky spergelord to pick up on these things either. I don't really care about buddy taking off his helmet for example but there are a ton of egregious examples that go way beyond nitpicking a small point.

Bhruic wrote on Oct 14, 2012, 11:08:No, what makes it stupid is that it is stupid.

Says you, but go on...

Bhruic wrote on Oct 14, 2012, 11:08:It's completely indefensible by anyone with even a basic level of reasoning. You know what killed more Native Americans than all the bullets the colonials brought with them? Infection. Infection from the same planet they were on, with the same atmosphere, the same lifeforms, the same biosphere. And yet because they'd never been exposed and hadn't developed any resistance, they died in droves.

And has been pointed out, no technology. Alters the 'social context' of it. You've also just implied that the Native Americans didn't have basic reasoning... Bit racist, that... Incidentally, the 1918 flu pandemic killed more people than the World War I. And? So what? What does it have to do with Prometheus? Apart from the notion of infection? As I mentioned before, it was a single scientist (who was asked not to but did it anyway), and as I pointed out, scientists have taken seemingly (and we now know, actually) crazy risks before (Roentgen, Curie, Jenner to name but three.)

Bhruic wrote on Oct 14, 2012, 11:08:Now you've got a bunch of people on an alien planet with potential alien lifeforms, bacteria, etc, and someone who claims to be a scientist thinks it's perfectly fine to take off his helmet simply because the atmosphere mixture is acceptable? "Oh, people tried to talk him out of it!" Sure, and when he idiotically did it anyway, wtf did the rest of the people do? Apparently, since he didn't keel over immediately, that means it's "safe", so all the other fucking idiots took their helmets off too.

Ancient Romans - used lead pipes for drinking water, 20th century Arctic explorers pulling a piano across the ice for entertainment; need I go on? These are real life examples. Did they turn out to be dumb? Yes. You can argue that the scientists in Prometheus should have known better, but with all that amazing technology - I know plenty of people who would have taken the same risk. Honestly, not sure I would have, but there are people who would. And lest we forget, again, the contagion was not airborne.

Bhruic wrote on Oct 14, 2012, 11:08:So apparently you either got your degrees from a cracker-jacks box, or are in complete denial over how stupid those actions were.

Or I can observe that just because I would not do something, doesn't mean other people wouldn't. I'm not a Nazi or in favour of the death penalty, but it doesn't automatically imply that they were (or indeed, I am) stupid. That would be tremendously closed minded and arrogant, no?

Bhruic wrote on Oct 14, 2012, 11:08:And that's only the frosting on the stupid cake that the movie was. It doesn't even go into stuff like "I spent my whole life studying these things, but since we didn't get immediate answers in the first 6hrs since we've got here, we are total failures".

One scientist, from the whole team, felt like this. Why? As is stated, he wanted them to be alive - to talk to them. He even says, "Is this just another tomb?!?" I'd be pretty pissed myself if I'd dreamt of meeting them my whole life, and not just a bunch of corpses.

Bhruic wrote on Oct 14, 2012, 11:08:Or "We have the technology to monitor the suits of the scientists in the structure, which apparently works fine despite the storm on the surface, but when they go missing, we can't simply look at their cameras to find out where they are and what's happened to them".

I didn't like that either, personally. Said so in my first post.

Bhruic wrote on Oct 14, 2012, 11:08:And I could keep going, but listing all of the rampant stupidity of the movie would take up the rest of the day, and I just don't have that kind of time to waste.

Or maybe you're being unfair to the movie? Hating on it just a bit too much? Like I said elsewhere, give it some time, and try it again? You might just like it. When I first saw Blade Runner over 20 years ago, I hated it. Now it's in my top five, and don't know what I was thinking. (Incidentally, Prometheus isn't, but you get the idea...)

nin wrote on Oct 14, 2012, 10:59:Well, when you're totally dismissive of people that don't agree with you, it kind of becomes a one sided conversation...

Just because you "shoot them down" (in your mind anyway) doesn't mean your view point is any more agreeable/correct.

Nin, I wouldn't be dismissive if people (not necessarily you!) didn't just say, "That was dumb! Prometheus sucked!" If you disagree, at least tell us why?

Blue, NBC showed it on local broadcast twice AFAIK. I watched it twice: in local AMC theater in film format (ugh) and in HD from NBC. Both sucked. See http://aqfl.net/node/6179 for the poll, comments, and my links.

Blue,Hopefully I caught you in time.I know you're curious, but don't. I, unfortunately, went to see it the day after it hit theaters and didn't have the luxury of having thousands of sources telling me it sucked. Remember what Phantom Menace did to the original trilogy?

Be one of the few that can say "I never saw Indy 4". I GUARANTEE you it will always be followed with "I wish I hadn't..."

Prez wrote on Oct 14, 2012, 12:34:Anyone who has ever enjoyed a sci-fi film has swallowed truckloads of insanely impossible stuff on the way, but now all of a sudden we need constant impeccable believability?

There's a concept known as "suspension of disbelief". What a good movie does is allow you to maintain that. What a bad movie does is constantly assault it. Promotheus did the latter. The problem is that people are focusing on single issues, and arguing that they aren't that big a deal. Granted, within the scope of a large movie, a single incident isn't enough to break suspension of disbelief. But what Prometheus had was a pattern of stupidity. If you've got a movie that focuses on a bunch of supposedly intelligent people, and you have them continuously make stupid decisions, that's more than sufficient to break suspension of disbelief.

If you take, say, Aliens (I remember it better than Alien), were there stupid things happening? Yup. But was it out of character? Nope. The majority of characters were "space marines", they weren't expected to be scientists, so it's not surprising that they made decisions that were questionable.

Note that suspension of disbelief doesn't just apply to sci-fi, it applies to every genre. It's one of the reasons that quite a few modern horror movies are considered "bad" - because the characters make decisions that are completely unrealistic. Prometheus had the problem that they had a direction they wanted the movie to go, but apparently they couldn't figure out how to get it there without all the mistakes taking place. It's a good indication they needed to work on the script a lot more. What could have been at least a good movie turned out to be, well, pretty bad.

The real reason is that Alien overall was a far better movie and thus worth closing a blind eye to its own logical fallacies.

Right, so all these discussions of Prometheus' lore and whatnot are moot. Setting all that aside, it was a totally forgettable movie. I didn't scream for my money back when it was over, but I didn't (and still don't) have any desire to watch it again.

In the end, yes, Prometheus was only an average movie at best in the general consensus (though I have met a couple of people who loved it, and who am I to say they shouldn't have?) but the level of nitpicking hysteria has reached epic proportions. It is just counterproductive imo. When I was younger and foolish I actually made my wife (girlfriend then) sit and watch Aliens with me despite her telling me she hated sci-fi with a passion. I figured it was such a fantastic movie there was no way she could not like it. Halfway through I noticed her checking the time and barely succeeding in surpressing eye rolls and laughter. She hated it! She thought it was one of the dumbest movies she ever saw, and proceeded to tell me in detail why. The laughably excessive complaining from supposed sci-fi fans about tiny minutiae in Prometheus reminds me of exactly that. Anyone who has ever enjoyed a sci-fi film has swallowed truckloads of insanely impossible stuff on the way, but now all of a sudden we need constant impeccable believability?

This comment was edited on Oct 14, 2012, 12:42.

“The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated.” - Mahatma Gandhi

The real reason is that Alien overall was a far better movie and thus worth closing a blind eye to its own logical fallacies.

Right, so all these discussions of Prometheus' lore and whatnot are moot. Setting all that aside, it was a totally forgettable movie. I didn't scream for my money back when it was over, but I didn't (and still don't) have any desire to watch it again.

And to those who would argue, "well you're in here discussing it so obviously it made an impression," well, I wouldn't be discussing it if it weren't brought up, and I'll be the first to say I had very high hopes going into the theater.

Hell, you don't have to look past 'Alien' to find a similar behavior - Dallas knowingly broke quarantine not even knowing if they could save Cane and risked killing everyone in the process (which actually fucking happened!!)

Once again a ship full of space miners != a ship full of supposedly genius-level scientists.

Nope - doesn't wash with me. There were quarantine laws that were clearly known by all on board Ripley's ship. I'm not a scientist but I know the dangers of pathogens and viruses and the reasons for quarantine. All of it sounds like lame justification for peoples' blatant inconsisteny in hating on one scene and not on the other. The real reason is that Alien overall was a far better movie and thus worth closing a blind eye to its own logical fallacies.

“The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated.” - Mahatma Gandhi

Hell, you don't have to look past 'Alien' to find a similar behavior - Dallas knowingly broke quarantine not even knowing if they could save Cane and risked killing everyone in the process (which actually fucking happened!!)

Once again a ship full of space miners != a ship full of supposedly genius-level scientists.

And while you brought up the subject of comparisons to Alien...

Alien was a small horror movie which happened to be set in space. It wasn't a science fiction epic. For all its other trappings, Prometheus was basically a "space slasher" (like the second half of Sunshine), and it wasn't very good at that, either. Other than the med bay scene, none of the action was memorable, and the med bay scene didn't hold a candle to the original chest burster.

PHJF wrote on Oct 14, 2012, 11:23:To be fair, American Indians didn't have interstellar starships, did they? If they have an automated medical bay which can perform Caesarean sections with fricken lasers they are probably equipped to handle alien microbes, viruses, and bacteria. I just don't think any of them were expecting to stumble into a cache of biological weapons.

The fact there was a cache of biological weapons isn't the relevant point. The evidence is that they weren't equipped to handle alien microbes, based on the fact that, well, they didn't. Indeed, there was no decontamination protocol at all when they re-entered the ship. No indication that they even considered the possibility that something like that could happen. Well, not strictly true - as the one woman, when talking about the guy who was infected by David says, "if it was airborne, we'd all be infected". Absolutely true, if it was airborne, they'd all be infected. Which is the point where it's too late to do anything about it. Other than get roasted alive.

I don't get the incessant complaining about the whole taking off the helmet thing myself. What in God's name is the big friggin' deal? Can bitching go viral? The rest of the team counseled against it, but he did it anyway, indicating that the movie writers were portraying it as a rash decision, hence it was not just a case of stupid writing. The scientist in question had already proven that he was more interested in investigating the discovery than safety, as evidenced by his insistence on heading immediately to the ruins once they arrived rather than waiting as the rest of the crew was suggesting. Which again is consistent with the somewhat reckless nature of the character. I interpreted it as the scientist not caring if he even survived the trip because the find was the culmination of his entire scientific career, but that may just be me.

I mean Jesus, people are going out of their way to hate on this film. I understand it was disappointing, but c'mon - if you are going to go to such lengths to anally nitpick every possible issue with every scene, you probably should just stop watching sci-fi. I mean, the same level of over-analysis could be applied to virtually every sci-fi movie ever made, even the good ones. Do I even need to point out the myriad logical fallacies in the "Terminator" films? And those were amazing movies. Hell, you don't have to look past 'Alien' to find a similar behavior - Dallas knowingly broke quarantine not even knowing if they could save Cane and risked killing everyone in the process (which actually fucking happened!!) yet in all my years I have never once heard a single soul complain about the stupidity or bad writing. Were we just easier to entertain then, or have we just gotten so crotchety in our obsession with maintaining our faux-intellectual personas we hold so dear on the Internet that we can't allow ourselves to enjoy anything without first micro-analyzing it for any and every possible flaw? How the hell do we ever allow ourselves to enjoy anything like that?

This comment was edited on Oct 14, 2012, 11:53.

“The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated.” - Mahatma Gandhi

Now you've got a bunch of people on an alien planet with potential alien lifeforms, bacteria, etc, and someone who claims to be a scientist thinks it's perfectly fine to take off his helmet simply because the atmosphere mixture is acceptable?

To be fair, American Indians didn't have interstellar starships, did they? If they have an automated medical bay which can perform Caesarean sections with fricken lasers they are probably equipped to handle alien microbes, viruses, and bacteria. I just don't think any of them were expecting to stumble into a cache of biological weapons.

pnag wrote on Oct 14, 2012, 06:23:Sooo... Let me get this straight... You're comparing a government run early space program, with three military trained pilots, that the world was watching... To one oddball scientist taking his helmet off? (As it is just Holloway at first, and they all do try to talk him out of it.) Tell me, was Jenner irresponsible when he didn't obey AMA guidelines for the first smallpox innoculation? Or was he a scientist working by himself? And Marie Curie! What an idiot! Her research killed her - would never happen in real life...

Oh wait, it did...

High school level science background? My degree, Masters and current undertaking of a PhD say otherwise. You thinking it's stupid does not make it so.

No, what makes it stupid is that it is stupid. It's completely indefensible by anyone with even a basic level of reasoning. You know what killed more Native Americans than all the bullets the colonials brought with them? Infection. Infection from the same planet they were on, with the same atmosphere, the same lifeforms, the same biosphere. And yet because they'd never been exposed and hadn't developed any resistance, they died in droves.

Now you've got a bunch of people on an alien planet with potential alien lifeforms, bacteria, etc, and someone who claims to be a scientist thinks it's perfectly fine to take off his helmet simply because the atmosphere mixture is acceptable? "Oh, people tried to talk him out of it!" Sure, and when he idiotically did it anyway, wtf did the rest of the people do? Apparently, since he didn't keel over immediately, that means it's "safe", so all the other fucking idiots took their helmets off too.

So apparently you either got your degrees from a cracker-jacks box, or are in complete denial over how stupid those actions were.

And that's only the frosting on the stupid cake that the movie was. It doesn't even go into stuff like "I spent my whole life studying these things, but since we didn't get immediate answers in the first 6hrs since we've got here, we are total failures". Or "We have the technology to monitor the suits of the scientists in the structure, which apparently works fine despite the storm on the surface, but when they go missing, we can't simply look at their cameras to find out where they are and what's happened to them". And I could keep going, but listing all of the rampant stupidity of the movie would take up the rest of the day, and I just don't have that kind of time to waste.